Gido
The
Trader
Gido stood on the top of the small hill and watched the caravan enter
the town. The midday sun shone warm on his dark skin, he combed his
short hair with his fingers and called his firelizard Drinda, a
beautiful silver-gold from Falas Weyr. He had got an egg because of his
swift delivery of some necessary heating devices needed. Drinda was
still young, but very gifted when it came to determing someone's
character. If Drinda didn't like a man or woman, Gido didn't trade with them.
DRINDA, the gifted :)
When Drinda appeared above his
shoulder, he urged his tired
runnerbeast into a last run to the town below. Drinda squeeled as she
raced ahead of them, sometimes blinking in and out of between. They
reached the town, just in time to see the wagon he shared with 2 others
being allowed to pass. He greeted his fellow traders and quickly got
down from his runner. He led the tired beast to a nearby water bassin to
let it drink. It would be a very hot day in the Southern Continent!
Their timing had been great, if they had been a few hours later they
would have had to let the runners and spans rest, setting them back even
more.
Gido and the 2 others, Dan, a big fellow with pitchblack hair, and
Leen, a young woman tagging along before returning to her family of
traders, she was on a test apparently, her parents wanted to see if she
could manage, in any case, leen didn't talk much. He had seen her
hovering around Drinda a lot though. Maybe she would like an egg when
they got back to Falas Weyr. He might get one for her. He had promised
her parents he would keep an eye out for her as payback for what they
had done for him when his parents had died. He didn't consider looking
after leen as a favor, he had to admit he had a crush on her. A lot of
guys would like her, she was tall and well built, more like a cat, with
an inner grace bordering on lazyness, but that was just appearance and
attitude. She was the smartest person he had ever met. And he just loved
her smile and the twinkle in her light blue eyes when she beat him in
cardgames. But she had never shown interest in him, or in any other man
in the caravan.
"Gido! Are you coming?" the tenor voice of Dan yelled. How such a big
man could have such a high voice, nobody knew, but it was a good singing
voice, and he was the only tenor in the caravan at the moment.
"Wait a minute! Fersi needs to be comfortable first!" He started to
work faster on stabling his runner, checking hay and water in the
vicinity and drying her. When she made quiet happy noises, he left to
meet Dan and Leen to check out the town.
This was one of the most crucial things in trading: finding customers
for their goods. Amongst the three of them they had woven cloth, leather, some medicins and
herbs, tools, metal and the precious skybroom
wood to be distributed to the local harper. They went to the harper
first, not only would he buy the wood, he would also know where they
could get the best price for their goods.
The harper was very helpful and suggested the Weyr to sell some goods. They payed good and would be able to use everything from their
wagon. There would be hatchings soon, so they would need new clothes and
boots. the tools would come in handy to repair some storm damage from
the winter storms and herbs would be bought by the head- woman.
They left early the next morning and entered the busy Weyr shortly
before noon. Gido had been in other Weyrs before, and they were usually
busy, but this was absurd. He grabbed the first person he noticed by the
arm and asked where they headwoman could find the headwoman. The man
pointed to a strong looking woman shouting and waving a spoon above her
head. Well, he had to go introduce them...he walked up to her, followed
by Dan and Leen and said:
"Goodday headwoman. We are traders and Garin, the harper thought you
could use some of our goods."
The headwoman looked him in the eyes and was silent for a while,
letting the words sink in, when she replied:
"Ah yes! We can use some new goods. I will come to you later."
They stood there, waiting, trying to find out what was happening in
the Weyr. Gido and Dan asked several people, Leen just stood, being very
shy. Gido smiled, she hadn't counted on a Weyr being as busy as this.
Apparently 3 dragons had clutched and they needed to clean out enough
space to accomodate them.
"No wonder they are busy" Dan said.
"yeah, the headwoman promised she would be back, so we'll just have
to wait" Gido replied.
Before the headwoman came back a blue dragon lifted his head and
looked straight at them. Leen anxiously took a step back, bumping into
Gido. He helped her find her balance, secretly being glad about the
contact, when he noticed Dan stepping away and saying:
"It's you 2 he wants..." followed by chirping of Dindra.
Gido noticed everything around him getting quiet. He couldn't help
but feel the blood rush to his cheeks.
"Wants who? Why?" He stumbled.
A man dressed in full riding gear answered:
"You! Ansith wants you 2 to stand for impression."
~***~
Hatching
They were all rushed upon the hatching
sands, all 21 candidates,
Green Tikiriath and Gold Sigleth’s clutches would
hacth simultanious. That meant 16 eggs....so 5 would remain, but they'd
probably impress later on, Ryslen had been bursting with activity lately. The eggs of the two dragonmothers lay on either sid of the
grounds, making it impossible for the candidates to look at the two
sides at the same time.
The first to hatch was one of Tikiriath's, a blue, then 2 red from
Sigleth's and again a green from Tikiriath's. Gido was counting and
looking so concentrated, he almost didn't notice the Crestless blue
appearing besides him.
"Switamth..." he whispered as he felt the
blue's presence in his head. They left the hatching ground to feed, but
not that is, until Gido craned his head to look at Leen, she was still
standing on the sands. With all his hearth he hoped she would impress.
Crestless Blue
Switamth
~***~
Weyrlings
Switamth dove down just in time to avoid hitting
the incoming brown. Gido held on to the dragon, promising himself never
to question the use of ridingstraps ever after. He heard his dragon
asking the brown what was the matter. Switamth sounded worried, Gido
sensed it through their bond, and realised it wasn't all Switamth's
panic, some of it came from the brown.
"I need help!" he kept crying and
crying in his mind. As far as Gido could tell the dragon was fine, but
he wasn't carrying a rider.
"Make him slow down Switamth! We'll need to know what happened to his
rider."
everything was quiet for a while, then Switamth answered
"Every weyrling is asking! My new friend
Grenadoth is confused!"
"OK, tell M'lengo to make the others stop asking questions. Then
we'll find out what's wrong."
His instinct, trained by a lifetime of trading took over, he told
Switamth to fly to the nearest clearing, leading the brown. Gido noticed
the other weyrlings swarming around M'lengo and then take off and
disappear. They showed the brown where he could land, the small blue,
not fully grown yet, landing right beside him. Now that Gido was closer
to the brown, he could see some small scratches on his sides, but
nothing that would hurt bad enough to cause a panic.
"Switamth try again, ask him what happened" he said when he saw
the two older riders coming closer.
"He went hunting with his rider and
several others. Thye had a good hunt, fat wherries!" Switamth said while
his eyes turned a shade more orange. "They stayed behind to swim. When
they came back wild cats jumped them from the heights. Grenadoth and his
rider got caught in the trees. His rider cut loose his straps so
Grenadoth was free. But the big cats kept coming, he was too big to land
or chase them away because of the trees. His rider told Grenadoth to
find help. We were closest." Switamth
ended.
By that time the other two dragons had landed in the giant clearing.
Switamth had spoken to them at the same time, so their riders were up to
speed. They would go to the rider and then contact the weyr to send them
the healer and guide the way to the spot.
All this had only taken about 5 minutes, but the riders feared they
would find the rider dead. The brown was in such a panic he only thought
about finding help. They hoped he wouldn't go between if his rider was
mortally wounded.
Switamth was the first to reenter after Grenadoth. They saw the rider,
still hanging from his straps. He had fainted. After he had cut loose
his straps he had fallen through the trees, getting caught on branches.
He had finally stopped falling 6 meters from the ground. Too high for
the cats to jump, so they had climbed the trees. The rider had been
extremely lucky, as he was hanging on very thin branches, too thin for
the felines to walk on. In stead they were now clawing at his straps. He
was about to fall when Switamth dove under him. As they flew between the
trees, Gido felt the branches scratch at his cheeks, he could see how
the brown hadn't been able to fly here. The cats snarled at him, but
were powerless in the trees with the branches shaking by Switamths
flight.
When they arrived back at the weyr the rider
had already regained consciousness and was fit enough to fly in on his
own dragon to his own weyr. He was quickly examined by the weyrhealer
and was then free to go back to his own weyr.
When Gido got back to his weyr, all he wanted to do was take a bath, but
as he entered he noticed Leen sitting on his chair.
"So, what happened? Tell me all about it!"
As much as he wanted that bath, the look in Leen's eyes was enough to
make him feel a lot taller and less dirty then he must have been at that
moment. He started to tell the story. He was about halfway, telling her
how he and Switamth had come out of between when he saw she wasn't
really paying attention, her eyes were unfocused. Leen was probably
talking to Jybarith. He continued, eyes looking at the ground, he felt a
bit sad, he had wanted her to like him more when she saw he had done a
good thing today. That's how he didn't notice her smile when her eyes
focused again. She took his head and kissed his lips. He was surprised,
but then Switamth appeared in his head:
"Isn't this what you wanted?"
He had to agree with that and closed his eyes.
~***~
Adult
Switamth promised Gido
he would be faithful to Jybarith. As he so nicely told his rider:
"I like her, why should I fly other greens?"
They would permit one clutch and then Jybarith would chew firestone.
~***~
Gido impressed at
Ryslen Weyr.
He is Weyrmated to Leen.